By: Maanvi Dhillon
Voter turnout in the 2019 McMaster Students Union presidential election fell 1.2 per cent from last year, marking the lowest rate since 2012.
Just two years ago, voter turnout sat at 41.6 per cent and saw 9,327 student voters.
“The voter turnout rate continues the impressive upward trend in McMaster student voter turnout, and marks five consecutive years with more than 40 per cent of students voting in the MSU Presidential election,” reads a statement on the MSU website from 2017.
This ‘upward trend’ did not continue the following year. In particular, the 2018 election saw voter turnout fall 13.6 points.
Following last year’s election, the MSU elections department promptly investigated the sharp decline in voter turnout.
After finding no issues with the voting software, Simply Voting, low turnout was estimated to have been caused by students opting out of receiving elections emails.
“Students who voluntarily opted-out of emails from the MSU’s election software provider, as per Canadian anti-spam legislation, did not receive future emails,” said Uwais Patel, the MSU’s chief returning officer.
Patel pointed out that this did not necessarily prevent students from voting in the election as they could have received a ballot if requested. However, it still likely would have reduced their likelihood of voting.
Low voter turnout is a serious concern given the role and position of the MSU president, who Patel describes as “an important representative who will help shape the student experience for years to come.”
As a result of the change, in this year’s election, students were able to
access their online ballot with their Mac ID instead of email.
Students were also enabled to use a general link and log in with their McMaster login information, eliminating the necessity of email for access and making the process fit more naturally with other online McMaster activity, like accessing Mosaic or Avenue to Learn.
For these reasons, Patel believed the transition would make “voting more accessible and the process of voting more reliable.”
Before the election, Patel was confident that the MSU Elections’ lineup of strategies would give students access to the details they need to easily vote.
“Using resources and technology, we are maximizing the way we deliver… information,” said Patel. “By voting and engaging with the election this year, students can be confident in who they elect as MSU President to represent them on issues pertaining to student life and advocacy,” said Patel.
In effort to increase voter turnout, the elections department also released an instructional video showing how to vote.
They also asked committee members and MSU Maroons to promote the election on campus and encourage students to vote.
However, this year’s drop in voter turnout suggests that the new voting system and array of promotional efforts did not sufficiently improve the turnout rate.
This year’s notably low voter turnout casts doubt over the new MSU president’s capacity to ‘represent’ McMaster’s nearly 30,000 undergraduates when only 6,576 voted in the election.
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By Donna Nadeem
Following of last year’s particularly low McMaster Students Union presidential voter turnout rate and suspicions that not all students received an email allowing them to vote, the MSU elections department has been making key changes to its email voting system.
In particular, MSU elections department investigated any technical issues with the MSU’s voting system Simply Voting. Ultimately, they found out that any students who marked MSU’s election emails as junk mail did not receive future emails from the MSU due to Canadian anti-spam legislation.
The elections department not only runs the elections for the MSU but for many clubs and faculty societies within the McMaster community. For instance, their services also facilitate the elections for four major faculty societies: the McMaster Science Society, McMaster Engineering Society, the McMaster Humanities Society and the McMaster Social Science Society.
[spacer height="20px"]As such, Simply Voting plays a significant role in facilitating voting in McMaster’s student elections.
This year, the elections department worked with Simply Voting to introduce Mac ID authentication into the voting system. This means that students will no longer need just their email to gain access to their ballot. Using the link to msumcmaster.ca/vote, students can now also use their McMaster login credentials to vote. Ballots remain secret and identifiable information is not collected.
“The new system was tested this past summer and during First Year Council Election which just finished, and no issues were reported,” said Uwais Patel, the MSU elections department chief returning officer.
Conveniently, the integration of Mac ID means that students can access their ballot without receiving an email.
“We will continue to schedule initial invitations to vote and periodic reminders to those who have not voted yet,” said Patel. “Moving forward, the email blasts sent should ensure maximum deliverability, but will be complemented with the promotion of our new voting link. Regardless, students will be able to access their ballot easily,” said Patel.
Moving to a MAC ID authentication system is expected to make voting more accessible and the process of voting more reliable. Voters are no longer reliant on email messages generated by Simply Voting to login.
This year, there was an unprecedented number of candidates running in the FYC elections, with 12 simultaneous elections occurring during the campaigning and polling periods. This was the first test for the new voting method, no issues with which were reported.
Voter turnout for the 2018 MSU FYC chair and vice chair election was only 21.6 per cent, with 1,373 students voting this year. Turnout for residence chair elections sat at 31.8 per cent, with 665 students voting. However, this marked a notable rise from last year’s 14.6 per cent FYC voter turnout.
The feedback received revealed that students appreciated being able to use the msumcmaster.ca/vote link to promote voting themselves.
On the FYC ballot, an optional question asked students for feedback regarding the work of the department. In the coming weeks, the MSU elections department will be carefully looking though those comments for more insight into potential future service enhancements.
“Email is simply one communication tool to drive voters to the voting link where the login to a ballot will be located. Therefore, spam filters will not have any impact on the election process,” said Patel.
However, students still need to click the link in the first place. In addition, the number of students who voted in the FYC election was quite low compared to the total first year student population. With these technological changes to the voting system, only future elections will tell if voter turnout will make a comeback in the winter presidential race.
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